Harper could have avoided this bizarre week but did not … because it plays to his advantage

There is just one rational explanation for the seemingly bizarre chain of events that has overtaken Ottawa this week, with Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his government once again engulfed in the Senate spending scandal, because of a battle with three former Conservative senators they could very easily have avoided.

Here it is: Harper wants a war. He chose this tussle understanding he’d take casualties, anticipating he’d be wounded, but calculating it wouldn’t be fatal.

This is what stands out about the prime minister’s performance in the House this week: He’s back, if not to his old form, then something close to it. It took Harper all of 10 seconds to send Sen. Mike Duffy, who’d seized centre ice earlier in the week with an explosive tale of skullduggery in the Prime Minister’s Office, back to the penalty box. “Mr. Duffy now says he is a victim because I told him he should repay his expenses,” the prime minister said Wednesday. “You’re darn right I told him he should repay his expenses.” Ka-boom!

Thursday was a variation on the theme, even in the face of a fierce assault from Opposition Leader Tom Mulcair.

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Duffy, of course, does not cut a sympathetic figure. Nor do senators Patrick Brazeau or Pamela Wallin. But that’s just the point. Let’s consider how the PMO is using these three former loyalists, and what that tells us about the regime.

First, we can now assume the drive to have them suspended without pay came to the Senate Conservative leadership directly from the man who appointed them all. Harper was asked about this pointedly by Opposition Leader Tom Mulcair in the Commons, and pointedly did not deny it. Indeed the prime minister has asserted he strongly supports the motions for suspension. In the Commons, he’s made it a point of pride.

Logically the prime minister has to know, by now, most or all of what Duffy knows about the transaction at the heart of this mess, that is the $90,000 payment to him from former PMO chief of staff Nigel Wright. He therefore cannot have been surprised by much of what was said this week by Duffy, or his lawyer Donald Bayne, or for that matter the other two senators on the hot seat. Indeed, he had to have anticipated most of it.

Bayne asserts the evidence made public thus far is “the tip of the iceberg,” and has hinted Duffy holds emails that suggest Harper knew about the Wright-Duffy payment before May 15 – which would be very problematic for the prime minister, as he has repeatedly denied such knowledge. In the House Wednesday, Harper went out of his way to reassert his long-held position. He did so forcefully and without equivocation of any kind. Thursday he repeated the assertion.

This suggests there is no smoking gun, at least not one tying Harper directly to the Wright-Duffy payment, and that he knows it. The most damaging elements – the alleged pressure tactics by Sen. Marjory LeBreton and current PMO chief of staff Ray Novak, the brutality of the manner in which these former insiders were made outsiders, the sheer ugliness of it all – may well be out there now. So in a sense it’s like taking a writedown, for a corporation: Push the three senators to the brink, let them tell their tales of betrayal, let the accursed media gallery have its delicious meal. It’s a bad few days. But who wins?

Beyond the bubble, a shooting war between Harper and three disgraced senators might be understood to help no one so much as Harper. Opposition statements or media coverage sympathetic to the senators’ plight – focusing, for example, on the arbitrariness of the move to cut them off, or the hypocrisy of shunning them for actions their own leadership apparently endorsed at the time – just further proves the “media elites” have it in for the Tories. It’s a classic wedge; possibly even a fundraising tool. Harper can now plant his flag on Main Street and blast the fat cats – people he himself appointed, but never mind that. It’ll play well at Tim’s.

Here’s why this unfolding scenario should be worrying, not just to Canadians, but to Conservative Canadians. It reinforces, not only that the prime minister doesn’t much care whether he’s trusted or liked, so long as he’s respected and feared; and is happy to trample on due process, if it suits him; but also that, truly, no colleague is safe who threatens his position. It’s not a new theme, because of prior incidents, including the purging of onetime cabinet minister Helena Guergis. But the trend line is steepening. Those closest to the Duffy mess, who are still standing – including LeBreton, Sen. David Tkachuk, and Sen. Carolyn Stewart-Olsen – might be well advised to watch their backs.

In the face of all this, the sheer dreck of it, Canadians are urged to remain placid, because we will soon have free trade with Europe, and the deficit is on track to being eliminated by 2015. Really? This is Canada, now? The gambit, if that is what it is, may succeed. Shame on us if it does.